This place is not your grandma’s pottery painting studio, I’ll tell you that much.
In Wisconsin for Matt’s grandma’s garage sale, the family and I took a couple of days to recover up in Door County. Along with cheese curds, beaches, and dairy farms, we spent half a day at the Hands on Art Studio in Fish Creek.
Holy cow.
For a lady who loves to dabble in anything DIY, who hates cookie cutter crafting, and who plans to move everyone out to a farm before the eldest baby is more than a decade old (I’m speaking of myself, here), the Hands On Art Studio? Was awesome.
Evening Breeze sustainable bedIt’s summer in the Northern hemisphere, and for many, that means going on holiday to warm, tropical locales. And using air conditioning. Lots of it. In fact, in some tropical places, nearly 80% of energy use in a hotel room is for air conditioning. 1200 to 2000 watts on average.
Evening Breeze is an interesting solution: It’s a canopy bed that has adjustments for both temperature and humidity, and delivers it quietly, overhead, using only 400 watts. As [...]
I’ve long been a fan of Ideal Bite and was excited when they introduced Mama Bite!
From family road trips to eco-friendly sunscreen to DIY crafts, Mama Bite gives you bite-size ideas for living light green this summer. Fun, healthy, eco-friendly tips are served up in a daily email each weekday.
As I take off from the ice runway at the British Antarctic Survey’s Halley base, situated on the Brunt Ice Shelf (75o34’S 26o34’W), I finally realise I am living and working at the extreme of human endurance. I am in one of the Survey’s De Havilland Twin Otters, known as Victor Papa Foxtrot Bravo Bravo (or VP-FBB), heading to the remote automatic weather station known affectionately as Baldrick, located at 83oSouth.
The weather station is hundreds of miles from the nearest living thing (human or otherwise) in the middle of the most inhospitable environment on the planet. My life is entirely in the hands of the pilot Mark; fortunately they are very skilled hands.
Funny what turns me on and this one hits the spot! It’s a biodegradable shower cap that can be used again, composted, or thrown straight to the trash. Guilt free is the key emotion here.
The LivinginPeace Project combines travel, art and education into a sustainable business model that is self-sufficient, energy efficient, environmentally responsible and socially empowering.
The project includes a backpackers’ hostel (www.rongobackpackers.com), a motel complex (www.karameamotels.com), a gallery (www.globalgypsy.com), a community radio station, permaculture farm and eco-tourism adventures. It is run by a group of dedicated, enthusiastic, positive volunteers from all over the world.
Our friends at the new site MapVivo.com are having a travel writing contest. To enter, you simply need to write a short travel journal for the site, upload some photos, and make your trip sound exciting. That’s it!
Among all entries received by June 15th, judges will select the winners from the 10 journals voted most popular by MapVivo users. The grand prize is a $1000 travel voucher to a destination of the winner’s choice. 5 runners up will receive free Bradt Travel guides to the destinations of their choice.
When they caution people about sitting in the “splash zone” at SeaWorld San Diego, believe it. Really. They should call it the soak zone. It’s a great way to cool off on a hot day, but it can ruin any electronic device you own not placed in a watertight case.
My family and I had an opportunity to visit SeaWorld San Diego this past January. Among the most popular attractions in San Diego, SeaWorld San Diego welcomes over 4 million visitors a year with their sea animal performances, aquariums and a few amusement rides. SeaWorld San Diego’s aquariums feature more than 5,700 fishes representing 434 species.
While SeaWorld San Diego has a long way to go to earn the distinction of being an ecotourism attraction, the park uses revenues from its admissions to actively implement conservation and animal rescue initiatives, even if they’re only softly mentioned throughout the park in signs and during announcements before animal performances. After all, we can’t start caring about nature if we don’t have an opportunity to interact with it. And for that, SeaWorld has honed its craft to capture the imagination of young and old alike and rekindled for many an awe and wonder that many of the avid conservationists and naturalists enjoy daily.
Instead of volunteer docents associated with living history museums providing interpretive programs, highly trained communicators and performers narrate the story of Shamu and friends as well as other exhibits throughout the park. In a world where a connection to nature couldn’t be more important, SeaWorld can jump start a greater appreciation of it, even if our understanding comes with splashes and tricks. Like they say at the Shamu Show: “We belong to the same family…”
There’s a lot to fascinate a small child or family at SeaWorld San Diego. But I was more amazed by what most visitors never witness, at least not directly, in the park: the SeaWorld Animal Rescue and Rehabilitation Program and a water filtration system that actually makes the water cleaner than when it first enters the park.
The Inspired Economist (IE) recently interviewed GE’s Bob King, a 30-year veteran of the company who has driven the company’s research in the advanced electric and hybrid vehicle space.
With the energy crisis of the late ’70s, GE began to aggressively pursue the development of an electric test vehicle, creating a prototype that included nearly all the components that can be found in today’s hybrid vehicles. Bob worked on this, and also on the development of GE’s hybrid bus in 1996. The bus established the emissions requirements for NYC’s hybrid transit buses and paved the way for those that you see on the roads today.
Bob has witnessed the cyclical nature of the country’s demand for energy-efficient cars and the changes in technology that have resulted in advancing the industry. Here’s what he had to say to IE.
IE: What is GE’s hybrid vehicle? Can you describe it? It’s USP?
BK: GE researchers are working on hybrid systems and battery technologies for a hybrid locomotive and for heavy-duty vehicle applications, which we believe could cascade down and help accelerate key advancements for Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicles (PHEVs) in the automotive sector. In fact, we also have been performing some research in conjunction with the lithium-ion battery maker A123Systems to support their battery development for automobile applications.
This week’s post is by Edward Burgess, coauthor of Environmental Defense Fund’s new report Reinventing Transit.
Last week, Congressman James Oberstar, chair of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, was slated to speak at the launch of EDF’s new report Reinventing Transit — but he got stuck in traffic! The irony was not lost on one commenter in the StarTribune.com blog who noted, “You couldn’t ask for a better footnote to the report.”
Watch our report video showing how people across the country are getting on board these innovative transit systems.
Editor’s note: Yep, that video’s changed places. Our embedding system is acting up, so here’s the video on YouTube.
Oberstar’s absence was a clear illustration of how traffic congestion is sapping time and productivity across the country. Cars stuck in traffic don’t just waste time, but they also waste fuel. This has consequences for the environment in terms of health and global warming. In fact, about a quarter of our country’s greenhouse gas emissions come from cars and trucks (see graph of breakdown of transportation sector).
On a recent trip to India, it finally dawned on me. I love Zimbabwe. Now don’t get me wrong, I didn’t say I love the seesaw economy, the shoddy politics, the hypocrisy and the corruption that comes along with the nation. I simply hold an undying love for the place of my birth and its diverse people.
What is it about India that made me realise this, you might ask. Visiting the sacred temples and sampling the aromatic food was breath-taking. And losing myself within the crowds of anonymous people released me from all of the responsibility I have to shoulder in my ‘real’ existence everyday. But ultimately, I could not really turn to any one of those well-meaning people and look at any of them with a twinge of painful familiarity and say, “We’ve come a long way.”
This place is not your grandma’s pottery painting studio, I’ll tell you that much.
